Kaoru Ishikawa, one of the forefathers of quality, believed that 95 percent of a company’s problems could be solved with the use of certain quality tools, often referred to as the basic seven. The basic seven is comprised of histograms, control charts, Pareto analysis, cause and effect diagrams, check sheets, scatter plots, and stratification. Seven quality professionals present explanations that provide the basics of how each of these tools is used. Material available online provides additional information about control charts and cause-and-effects diagrams, as well as summaries of nearly 1,000 products and tools featured in the Quality Progress toolbox since 1999.